This paper seeks to develop an understanding of the issues that public administrators should strive to provide in ethical practices and governance thus allowing distinctive administrative and social traditions that each country possess to flourish. Significant changes and continuities in the realm of government in contemporary China and Malaysia will be drawn upon. Recent developments have brought a sense of urgency in contrast to complacency with the status quo. This paper reviews pertinent administrative and ethic issues related to both countries and whether the administrators engage in sustaining the reform agenda while still maintaining the professional capacity and flexibility of administrators when re-delegating responsibly within changing institutional settings. public administration, state, policy, administrative reforms, governance

Files in this item: 1

Re-Conceptualising Notions of Chinese-ness in a Southeast Asian Business cum Societal Context

Jacobsen, Michael(København, 2006)

[More information]

[Less information]

Abstract:

This paper explores the role of the Chinese in a Southeast Asian business cum societal context; from different approaches towards Chinese-ness over different notions of intra- and inter-ethnic relation ending up with a critique of the idea of a Chinese diaspora in a Southeast Asian context. The paper furthermore argues that a culturalist reading of Southeast Asian Chinese modes of engaging in capitalist practices and societal entrenchments constitute a deception that produces a variety of stereotypes of Chinese-ness thus disregarding the complexity and dynamic developments within the ethnic Chinese community region-wise. Finally, in relation to Chinese business practices in a Southeast Asian context the paper suggests that cultural notions of guanxi and xinyong do not form a basis for doing business the Chinese way, only options, that intra-ethnic relations do not play an important role in transnational Chinese linkages, and that contemporary conceptions of Chinese identity are always negotiated with the dominant ‘other’ so as to secure the construction of an economic ‘room’ or space from where business can be conducted in an overall societal acceptable manner.
Key words: Ethnic Chinese, diaspora, entrepreneurship, ethnicity, identity

Files in this item: 1

With China’s rapid economic progress and steady increase in its international
influence, China has gradually embarked on the soft power idea and has made
developing its soft power as its national strategy. We argue that China’s soft
power strategy is in accordance to Chinese Confucian culture and political value
and fits well with its grand strategy of peaceful rise. Based on existing
conceptualizations of soft power, we expanded the sources of soft power to six
pillars: cultural attractiveness, political values, development model, international
institutions, international image, and economic temptation. We also identified
three channels for wielding soft power: formal, economic, and cultural
diplomacies. Putting all the basics together, we present an integrative model of
soft power. Accordingly, we analyze the sources and limits of China’s soft
power and suggest how to improve it.

Files in this item: 1

This article analyses the changes of ownership and identities of Malaysia’s locallyowned banks in a series of merger and acquisitions (M&A) within national border and beyond. The article begins with description of the establishments of local banks in
Malaya and later Malaysia which were mainly founded and owned by ethnic Chinese. The author then examines how the internal factors (protracted affirmative action policy and the consolidations of local banks by the state) and external factors (forces of globalization) had changed Malaysia’s local banks from mainly Chinese-owned to state-owned and from medium-size domestically-based to large-scale regionally-based banking groups. The author shows how the internal factors have been shaping the ownership and identity of Malaysian banks, which aim to facilitate the formation of a Malay entrepreneurial class. The author also show how the external factors have been shaping the strategies and size of the Malaysian banking groups to become huge regional banks to compete with foreign banks for sizable and value deals in the region, in the context of greater liberalization of the financial sector.

Files in this item: 1

It is a received opinion that China’s emergence as a regional and global power is the most pivotal transformation underway in East Asia. China’s enhanced economic standing in Asia has given her new political influence in the region as her trade with the neighbouring states, in particular the member countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to her south, has been expanding rapidly in recent years. The stunning economic growth of China has created tremendous business opportunities and signed deals has been drawing increasing volume of foreign investment into this Asian giant that was described to have shaken the world – not with her armies, but with her factories. Whether this market is really that huge with potential as has often been presumed and taken for granted is today a topic hotly debated all over the world. With increasing number of foreign companies setting up their businesses in China and the China-ASEAN Free Trade Area – projected to be the world’s largest FTA covering 1.7 billion consumers with a combined GDP of US$2 trillion and to be completed within ten years from the setting of its framework agreement in November 2002 – poised to become the core of a broader East Asian economic zone in years to come, this paper attempts to explore the implications, opportunities and challenges arising with the establishment of the ACFTA, the achievement, prospect and challenges with respect to the Early Harvest Program (EHP) and Agreement on Trade in Goods (TIG), potential competition arising from the free flow of goods, impacts on growth, production sharing, possible trade diversion effects and institutional and other factors in market penetration, within the context of both global business linkages and domestic market nexus in the light of the expanding China-Malaysian bilateral trade and China’s deepening partnership with ASEAN.
Keywords: China, ASEAN, Malaysia, CAFTA/ACFTA, trade, investment

Files in this item: 1

China is a latecomer to preferential trading agreements (PTAs), choosing to complete its accession to the WTO before embarking on negotiations for preferential agreements. Since 2001, China has become a very active player in such agreements, currently having concluded treaties or being in the process of negotiating them with close to 30 partners. China’s approach to PTAs is characterized by pragmatism; rather than following the American and European practices of using a template for all partnerships, China has been willing to tailor agreements to the specific relationships it is pursuing. Like other governments, China has a mixture of motives in pursuing PTAs. In some relationships, diplomatic/strategic considerations are paramount. In others, China seeks to pursue various economic interests, one of the most significant of which has been security of supply of raw materials. China’s various motivations in PTAs are examined through three case studies: the Closer Economic Partnership Agreement with Hong Kong; the China-ASEAN Free Trade Area; and the negotiation of a PTA with Australia.

Files in this item: 1

China’s "soft power" re-emergence in Southeast Asia Johannes Dragsbaek Schmidt Associate Professor Research Center on Development and International Relations Aalborg University Email. jds@ihis.aau.dk ABSTRACT Globalization is rapidly changing the overall structure of the international division of labor with the shift of services and manufacturing from the old industrialized economies to the new emerging giants - the global office platform in India and the global factory floor in China. This dislocation in production, services and manufacturing signifies a challenge which might be more important, but nevertheless part and parcel of the inherent imbalances in the world economy. Until recently there has been much academic and layman attention on over-production, growing inequalities, the increasing North-South gap, the roaring conflicts over energy and raw materials including oil and water, turbulence and crisis in the international financial system, and not least the fact that the present phase of capitalism has led to jobless growth in the established core economies in Europe and the United States. The question for the international political economy is where and how do countries like India and China fit in?
Keywords: Globalisation, Regionalism, Bilateralism, Diaspora, USA, China, Southeast Asia

This paper discusses three scenarios concerning China’s recent trade negotiations and relations with the United States and the European Union. Chinese commentators and academics are sure that their country ‘is firmly on the path of greater integration with the global economy’ and that this is ‘a path that has provided great benefits for China and for the world in general.
However, they are also be well aware of the problems associated with entering a global economy where free trade/level playing field market principles have not ended either agricultural subsidies or import quotas on manufactured goods. Indeed, as argued in this paper, measures taken in the name of neo-liberal free market ideals have, ironically, spawned an ever-growing mass of quotas imposed by the EU and the US on the importation of Chinese clothing, footwear and textiles.
Keywords: China, subsidiaries, WTO, USA, EU

Files in this item: 1

China is now the world’s second largest oil-consuming country after the U.S.. Its global efforts to secure oil imports to meet increasing domestic demand have profound implications for international relations in the Asia-Pacific region. China’s rising oil demand and its external quest for oil have thus generated much attention. As China’s overseas oil quest intensifies, will China clash with the U.S. and other western countries’ interests in Africa, and how does it look at this rivalry? Will China disrupt the U.S. and its allies’ foreign policy and the world order? China, oil strategy, African oil, U.S., energy rivalry

Files in this item: 1

Denmark was among the first countries in the world to recognize the People’s Republic of China. The created a good foundation for the development of a special relationship between China and Denmark, culminating in Prime Minister, Poul Hartling’s meeting with Mao in October 1974 and characterized by further intensification of political, economic and cultural relations from the beginning of the 1980s. The recent agreement to establish a joint Sino-Danish University Centre in Beijing constitutes yet another high point. However, there have also been incidents of tension and conflict. This paper will especially address three of these incidents: the “cartoon crisis” of August 1967, the Danish criticism of China’s human rights record in the spring of 1997, and the controversy relating to the Dalai Lama’s visit to Denmark in May 2009. It is argued that the costs of pursuing a policy towards China based on normative considerations have become too high and is difficult to harmonize with a new Danish foreign policy of active internationalism.

Files in this item: 1

The focus of this paper is on the strategies applied by Singapore-Chinese businesses upon failing in their China business ventures. It has been argued that both the increase of Singapore ventures into China and the failures are due to either cultural issues (misinterpretation of ‘shared ethnicity’) or economic factors (differences in economic practices). Singapore businessmen apply inclusive strategies combining Western management styles with Chinese ways of doing business in order to reduce the risk involved with investments across national borders into China. Though largely successful, this strategy entails its own risks. Based on 10 case studies, this paper discusses the ways in which Singapore Chinese entrepreneurs respond upon failing in China and the strategies they develop to re-find their comfort zone for transnational business ventures.
Keywords: Chineseness, Ethinicity, Entrepreneurship, Singapore, China, Business Strategies.

Files in this item: 1

This chapter try to highlight some key elements of Chinese thinking described from a cultural and philosophical perspective starting with explaining the background for Chinese philosophy, mainly Confucianism followed by central concepts such as holism (ying/yang) and a discussion of the concept of change that appears to be somewhat unique because of the central position change occupies in the Chinese philosophy. More specific, but still important concepts like face, guanxi, the Middle way and paradoxes way are also elaborated on. For reference comparison is now and then made to western philosophy when it is found to clarify Chinese thought. Comparative philosophy brings together philosophical traditions that have developed in relative isolation from one another and that are defined quite broadly along cultural and regional lines -- Chinese versus Western is here chosen, but it is not to indicate that similar phenomena might not have appeared in other places in the world if not stated explicitly.

In this paper, I first critique the composition-based view of Yadong Luo and John Child for understanding how resource-poor firms survive and thrive. To remedy the deficiencies in their perspective, I then propose a dynamic theory of compositional advantage and strategy. Here, the compositional advantage is redefined as the attractiveness of the composition of the producer’s offering in terms of scope and perceived value/price ratio. I identify five ways or basic compositional strategies to improve the value/price ratio. A firm may have an overall compositional strategy that is composed of some or all of the five basic compositional strategies. I argue there are three indispensable key success factors for a composition-based competition, i.e., aspiration (ambition-position asymmetry), attitude (being ALERT), and action (turning asymmetry into advantage). I also discuss the particular relevance of the present theory to understanding Chinese firms. I conclude with managerial implications and suggestions for future research.

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to describe the status of culture studies within the field of international business research, and to examine how two main paradigms – essentialism and social constructivism – relate to the discourse in this field. We analyze the main points of the two paradigms, and discuss how the relationship between them has evolved.
Findings - We show that essentialism and social constructivism have a paradoxical relationship. They seem to be mutually exclusive, yet each offers unique insights into the notion of culture. Both are necessary for a complete understanding of culture, yet they cannot be integrated in any normal sense. We see the relationship between the two paradigms as paradoxical: that is, we see them as ontologically complementary yet epistemologically incommensurable. Taking inspiration from Bohr’s principle of complementarity, we understand the two competing paradigms of culture studies as both necessary and yet as incompatible.
Research limitations - Future research should help to improve the conceptual clarity with which the relationship between the two paradigms is portrayed here, thereby enhancing the empirical rigor of the argument we make in this paper.
Practical implications – We encourage practitioners to learn how to switch, both sequentially and spatially, between the two paradigms of culture (fundamentally incommensurable though they are). This involves taking a “both/or” approach to the two paradigms.
Originality/Value - We show for the first time that Bohr’s complementarity principle is illustrative and useful for understanding the paradoxical relationship between essentialism and social constructivism. Inspired by two principles enunciated by Bohr – that of complementarity and that of classical concepts – we argue that the two competing paradigms are necessary yet
3
incommensurable. We therefore suggest that culture scholars switch between the two paradigms, instead of seeing each as negating the other.

Although China is not a federal country, its public finance system does carry features of fiscal federalism. Since 1949, although the central government has consistently sought to exercise strong control over the country, it has at times done so by decentralist rather than centralist policies. The Dengist policies since economic reform began, for example, have had a strongly decentralist element, with continuing devolvement of control to the provincial governments, sometimes to such a degree that some observers have commented: "the centre pretends to rule and the provinces pretend to be ruled". This is also a period that witnessed the revival of old regionalisms, as well as the creation of new regionalisms brought about by increased local autonomy, rapid economic growth and increasingly globalizing trade and business linkages. While the oft-cited "China deconstructs" scenario seems at present far-fetched, the challenges posed by central-peripheral conflicts, ethnic resource contest and ethnoterritorial aspirations are real, in particular as they are being exacerbated by the country’s "retreat from equality�? and growing interregional economic disparity. In the light of these daunting exigencies, this paper explores the political economy of regional development in China, focusing on the intricate link between the country’s ethnic diversity and the role of the State in the economy, as the Asian giant warily enters a new stage of economic reform.
Keywords: China, regionalism, ethnic diversity, inequalities, uneven development, regional disparities

International business (IB) studies revolve around two key perspectives that can be defined as a firm specific perspective and a generic perspective that combined provide a company with crucial insights into how to enter and navigate a foreign market. Combined, such an approach provides a company with a holistic perception of what kind of resources and capabilities that are needed when entering a specific market as well as what to expect of the host market that the company is planning to enter. The key issue here is how to design a research strategy that is to provide the analyst with data that makes him or her capable of developing a pertinent explanatory framework for how to engage a foreign market. Before starting to look for appropriate research methodologies and tools for data collection, however, a pertinent philosophy of science point of departure has to be selected. This article has chosen to discuss three different philosophies of science. Each one of them is capable of providing the analyst with a specific take on how to ‘think’ data that are being extracted. Arguably, whatever approach one selects, the choice will have a crucial impact on the outcome of the research process. After settling down on a specific philosophical of science the article moves on to apply this on the Danish shipping company Maersk Line. The key focus here is on how employees at headquarter and in selected subsidiaries ‘read’ the company’s global corporate culture so as to be able to navigate this particular company to their own benefit as well as to the company’ per se. The article closes with a critical discussion of the ramification of selecting one philosophy of science over another when engaging in either qualitative or quantitative research in an IB context.

Files in this item: 1

Professor Peter Ping Li has made important contribution to the promotion of indigenous management research in China in general and application of Chinese Yin-Yang philosophy to organizational paradox research in particular. However, his interpretation of Yin-Yang is incomplete and inaccurate. Namely, his notion of Yin-Yang balancing relates to only one of five distinct epistemological expressions of Yin-Yang in the Chinese literature and its derived methodological prescription, i.e., Confucian principle of Zhong-Yong. Yet, his notion of Yin-Yang balancing is an inaccurate representation of Zhong-Yong due to his dogmatic insistence on asymmetry in the structure of combination of opposites that is not a prescription of the Zhong-Yong principle. Due to his incomplete understanding of Yin-Yang, he has not been able to see the value of the ambidexterity approach and its compatibility with the Yin-Yang thinking in particular and the similarity between Chinese and Western approaches to solving paradox in general. This paper alerts Chinese management scholars to the danger of overconfidence and Chinese exceptionalism and calls for a modest and prudent attitude in pursuing Chinese indigenous management research.

This paper tries to see the role of the actual expenditure on pollution and control equipment in a particular State on the location choice of foreign firms in India. Based on Levinson (2001), we compute Industry-adjusted pollution abatement expenditure index for 25 States for different time periods using Annual Survey of Industries data to see if FDI inflow is affected by any variation in pollution abatement expenditure (reflecting environmental governance). The index compares the actual pollution abatement expenditure in a particular State, unadjusted for industrial composition, to the predicted abatement expenditure in the same State (where the predictions are based on nationwide abatement expenditures by industry and each State’s industrial composition). If adjusted index is low for a State, this implies that the State has poor environmental governance and this would induce foreign firms to invest. In other words, our study tests for ‘pollution haven’ hypothesis. Our results do not find any evidence of pollution haven hypothesis for 21 Indian States. Other variables are more important in influencing foreign firms’ decision than environmental stringency.

Files in this item: 1

Differential Effects of FDI on Wages and Employment in Indian Manufacturing

Sharma, Shruti(Frederiksberg, 2016)

[More information]

[Less information]

Abstract:

This paper considers the differential effects of industry-level Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) on plant-level employment and wages of skilled and unskilled workers of India’s manu- facturing sector, based on the size of the plant. I find that there are strong positive differential effects to big plants in terms of employment and average wages of both skilled and unskilled workers relative to average sized and small plants with increased industry-level inward FDI. Further, this relative increase in employment of production workers at big plants is biased to- wards male workers. Average sized and smaller plants experience negative effects of inward FDI which can be explained in terms of intra-industry reallocation of output from smaller to bigger plants and poaching of higher quality production and skilled workers by bigger plants as industry-level FDI increases. However, in a more detailed analysis, I find that in regions where FDI inflows are large and persistent, there are strong positive effects in terms of increases in skill composition and wage-skill premium to both big and small plants alike. This suggests that for plants to experience positive effects of industry-level FDI, a critical mass of inward FDI needs to be achieved. The findings are important especially in the context of India’s recent Make-in-India campaign which combined with the objectives of the National Manufacturing Policy and the National Skill Development Corporation strives to increase India’s productive capacity in order to generate positive employment effects, and especially increase the pool of skilled workers in India’s manufacturing sector.

This study examines the role of financing constraints in explaining outward FDI decisions using unique firm level panel data on Indian manufacturing during the period 2007–2014. We consider the role of both internal finance and external finance in firm decisions on outward FDI and employ instrumental variable probit model to examine financing constraints in outward FDI decisions of firms. Further, using count data models, we examine financing constraints in determining strategies regarding number of affiliates abroad. The study shows that firms with higher cash flow and liquidity are likely to have more number of foreign affiliates.